Yellow lillies and purple dandelions
make room for pink roses and white daisies
it's spring,
nearing a summer's Sunday in California.

And where is she?

Open hands,
daystars of heaven flicker lightly
against her palms.

Clear and ready to receive,
soul filling up,
overflowing with each passing
piercing aria.

Titillated.
mesmerized.

She's right where she wants to be,
consciously present,
a towering moment.

Seduced.
heart exploding.

It reaches beyond the shell
of her,
and penetrates the soul of her.

A desperate satisfying cry,
encore! encore!

Straps of turquoise nuggets
adorn her feet,
her bare-back skin
with sheer medieval halter dress
sweeps past her knees.

Her Los Angeles suntan arms
wave passionately about
the warm Dodger's cosmos.

She rises to her feet.
cries another satisfying cry.

It happens.
illuminated once more.

From backstage,
they walk out,
jovial
tuxedoes-----like well-dressed penguins;
one follows the other.

She's suspended again.

And where is she?
I dare retort?

Why,
she's in heaven of course!
and there they are too!

Carreras, Domingo, Pavarotti,
and oh her Mehta.

_____from Songs of a Journey's End, a poet's companion to the tetralogy, Laying Within the Mark, the series